Dan Garodnick Comes Out Against Stop-and-Frisk Too

In yet one more sign of the political winds shifting against stop-and-frisk, another candidate for citywide office has come out against the current practices of the NYPD tactic today. East Side Councilman Dan Garodnick, a top contender for Comptroller John Liu’s job in 2013, penned a letter to Police Commissioner Ray Kelly asking him to “firmly commit to revisiting this practice, reducing the overall number and disproportionate application of stops made each year and ensuring that stops are based on individualized reasonable suspicion.”

“The numbers are jarring and strongly suggest that the NYPD is either pressuring its officers to make these stops without reasonable suspicion, or is simply not concerned about getting it right,” he explained. “Either scenario does not reflect well on the NYPD or the City. Of course, the justification offered for such a wide-scale interference with the liberties of mainly black and Latino New Yorkers is that it has resulted in a decline in crime. However, even as the number of stops made each year has skyrocketed, there has been virtually no change in the number of gunfire victims in New York City.”